Judge blocks CHAOS again...

[ils2minimums]

Just keep shopping and you'll find a judge who'll give you the ruling you want...


Bloomberg.com: Investment Tools

 

[XJohXJ]

The continued loss of our hard-earned rights is disgusting. We should all be ashamed of ourselves for collectively dropping the ball. In some third world countries, labor leaders are still arrested and beaten. Do we need to fall that far before we regroup and start fighting back?

 

[accinelli]

The continued loss of our hard-earned rights is disgusting. We should all be ashamed of ourselves for collectively dropping the ball. In some third world countries, labor leaders are still arrested and beaten. Do we need to fall that far before we regroup and start fighting back?

Hard-earned rights!! Since when does serving Orange Juice with an offensive attitude and an extreme sense of entitlement qualify for hard work.

 

[Dizel8]

"The Railway Labor Act, which governs the railroad and airline industries, is designed to promote resolution of major company-union disputes, not to give ``parties a premature license to engage in open industrial hostilities,'' he said".

Are you frigging kidding me, this is just sad! It should have taken a competent judge 10 seconds to rule, that once you impose terms on people, who were working under a negotiated contract, then that contract, including RLA provisions, becomes null and void.

 

[JP4user]

ALPA's silence on this far reaching ruling is disgusting. This affects all labor groups and has now turned labor into indentured servants.

 

[FNG320]

The way I understand the RLA, when the first court ruling came down, the union should have went to the NMB and declared an impass and stopped negotiating with the company. Then the 30 day clock would have started and at the end of the 30 day cooling off period they could have stuck as the RLA says. Then, no matter how the judge ruled in the matter of an imposed contact and stike, they could have started CHAOS legally under the RLA at the end of the 30 days. It has been way over 30 days since all of this stated for them.

The problem is thet the FAs/union wanted to keep negotiating without an impass and strike/CHAOS on their own short-notice time table instead of the one established in the RLA (which is much harder for the company to plan around and bring in replacement workers from the far east). But they could have started the formal "30day clock" any time they wanted to.

Just my opinion......

FNG

 

[PCL_128]

The way I understand the RLA, when the first court ruling came down, the union should have went to the NMB and declared an impass and stopped negotiating with the company. Then the 30 day clock would have started and at the end of the 30 day cooling off period they could have stuck as the RLA says. Then, no matter how the judge ruled in the matter of an imposed contact and stike, they could have started CHAOS legally under the RLA at the end of the 30 days. It has been way over 30 days since all of this stated for them.

The problem is thet the FAs/union wanted to keep negotiating without an impass and strike/CHAOS on their own short-notice time table instead of the one established in the RLA (which is much harder for the company to plan around and bring in replacement workers from the far east). But they could have started the formal "30day clock" any time they wanted to.

Just my opinion......

FNG

Not true. The impasse and 30-day clock are part of the Section 6 process. The FAs were never in Section 6 negotiations in the first place, so the processes outlined in the RLA that deal with a 30-day clock do not apply. Also, the union is not able to declare an impasse on their own. They can request it, but the mediator must officially declare it and start the clock. In this case, there never even was an NMB mediator since the FAs were never in Section 6 talks. These negotiations were governed by bankruptcy law, not Section 6 and the RLA. That's what makes this judge's decision so absurd.

 

[Caveman]

The way I understand the RLA, when the first court ruling came down, the union should have went to the NMB and declared an impass and stopped negotiating with the company. Then the 30 day clock would have started and at the end of the 30 day cooling off period they could have stuck as the RLA says. Then, no matter how the judge ruled in the matter of an imposed contact and stike, they could have started CHAOS legally under the RLA at the end of the 30 days. It has been way over 30 days since all of this stated for them.

The problem is thet the FAs/union wanted to keep negotiating without an impass and strike/CHAOS on their own short-notice time table instead of the one established in the RLA (which is much harder for the company to plan around and bring in replacement workers from the far east). But they could have started the formal "30day clock" any time they wanted to.

Just my opinion......

FNG

The problem as I see it is they are still trying to act like there is a negotiated process in place when there really isn't. The contract is gone and the company can impose any work rules and compensation that it wants to. They haven't yet but it's a smoke screen. They are trying to make it look like there is still a legal process in place for 'negotiations' when there really isn't. There is no labor agreement nor any requirement to abide by anything the RLA or the NMB says. Yet, this knucklehead judge has arbitrarily decided that there still is. On what basis? There is no contract to negotiate. They are at will workers.

 

[FDJ2]

ALPA's silence on this far reaching ruling is disgusting. This affects all labor groups and has now turned labor into indentured servants.

You're just not listening. ALPA has been ahead of this issue. Now if only more members would support ALPA-PAC perhaps we can make some changes in DC and get more labor friendly legislation and a more labor friendly DOJ & DOT.

From the President

Workers' Rights in the Balance
Capt. Woerth's Labor Day Message
September 2006
Once again, the United States celebrates Labor Day weekend. While American troops fight for other nations’ citizens’ freedoms, American workers’ freedoms and rights have reached a new low watermark. Throughout the long, torturous road through more than 20 airline bankruptcies since 9/11, one gigantic legal question has been hanging over airline workers’ heads like a surreal guillotine:

Do airline workers have the right to strike if management imposes new terms and conditions on them and the courts throw out their contract?The rest of the free world believes that the answer is an obvious “yes.” However, this is the 21st-century American experience, where the answer is not so clear. To absolutely no one’s surprise, the Department of Justice took the side of Northwest Airlines management in court and argued that airline workers have no such right to strike. The judge at least temporarily agreed and enjoined a strike by Northwest flight attendants, who have labored under imposed terms and conditions for nearly a month.

This has the same effect as a temporary injunction, because the judge will not make his final ruling until a later date. But this ruling ignores the Norris-LaGuardia Act and makes a mockery of the Railway Labor Act and any sense of justice. The implications to Mesaba and Comair are ominous indeed. Future airline bankruptcies could leave workers as latter-day indentured servants with no rights of recourse against their masters during bankruptcy – if this injunction is permanently granted.

Let me be perfectly clear. While these draconian decisions and questions were avoided in the other airline bankruptcies, every single airline management made astoundingly aggressive concessionary demands, precisely because those managements believed that, at the end of the day, the Justice Department would rescue them if workers tried to strike. Managements always believed that an injunction would save them. They always believed that the fix was in.

If the Justice Department legal arguments didn’t convince a judge, the Department of Transportation could always declare a transportation emergency. Or the Labor Department could make up a fantasy labor emergency—anything to strip working Americans of their rights. The outcome of this case matters to every airline worker in the United States.

As Labor Day approaches, all pilots must be clear-eyed realists and admit the astounding amount of raw political power and government leverage that has been used against us since 9/11. Democracy is not a spectator sport. Every one of us must get involved and support candidates who will work to restore our rights and return working Americans to their place of honor, so that Labor Day will be more than just a three-day weekend. Candidates from both parties must be held accountable. They are either part of the solution, or they are part of the problem.

 

[FNG320]

The problem as I see it is they are still trying to act like there is a negotiated process in place when there really isn't. The contract is gone and the company can impose any work rules and compensation that it wants to. They haven't yet but it's a smoke screen. They are trying to make it look like there is still a legal process in place for 'negotiations' when there really isn't. There is no labor agreement nor any requirement to abide by anything the RLA or the NMB says. Yet, this knucklehead judge has arbitrarily decided that there still is. On what basis? There is no contract to negotiate. They are at will workers.

Caveman,
I totally agree. The judge is saying the "imposed contract" is a labor agreement and that they can't just strike when they want to. You and I both know that any imposed contract/work rules/pay is not negotiated, its a form of slave labor. But I guess it become an issue of "you can take it or you can leave". All of the FA could quit if they wanted to, the imposed contract does not prevent them from quiting.

But until they find a judge to rule in thier favor the only self help they have would be to "individually" strike and thus they could be fired. Now, there could be lots of semi-CHAOS sick calls that come close to CHAOS and prevent them from being fired, and that could put some big holes in the operations if timed correctly, but that is a tough nut to crack and they risk their jobs and the union could face charges/fines if it was organized. (how about just publishing a list of weak spots/flights and let the FA decide if they want to do it on thier own).

All I am saying, it they could have played both avenues and been in a position to strike now. Had they declared an impass and the 30 day clock would have started. Instead they have gone down the single path of finding a judge that will rule that an imposed contract does not fullfil the definition of a negotiated contract.

Overfall I agree it is wrong (the judge), but till a judge will rule in the FA's favor they are stuck. In 20/20 hind sight, they should have walked on day one (months ago) before any judge ruled on the subject, but they tried to play nice and keep the public on their side. Any strike is normally bad PR, so that was a waisted effort and cost them the element of surprise. Plus NWA never plans nice and would have blamed the FAs no matter what. I think it would have only take a few days of a stike for managment to have quickly come to a negotiated agreement to prevent permanent damage to NWA and liquidation.

I just hope they can get a judge soon before NWA get is act togehter to break the FA's union with non-union FAs from the far east. (like the Mech).

Just my opinion.....

FNG

 

[FDJ2]

According to the American Bar Associations study of the issue in 2003, this Judge has drawn an absurd conclusion, albeit a politically expedient one.

American Bar Association
Section of Labor & Employment Law
RAILWAY AND AIRLINE LABOR LAW COMMITTEE
2003 MIDWINTER MEETING
Surf and Sand resort, Laguna Beach, CA
March 3-5, 2003
BREDHOFF & KAISER, P.L.L.C.

E. Conclusion: The Right to Strike Preserved
When it enacted Section 1113, Congress relieved employers of their
Section 6 responsibilities – it provided employers with a shortcut to unilateral
implementation. While nothing explicit was directed towards the right to
strike, it seems almost absurd to suggest that Congress intended to (1) relieve
employers of their responsibilities under an otherwise valid collective
bargaining agreement, (2) permit debtors to unilaterally implement terms of
employment without first adhering to Section 2(First) and Section 6, while at
the same time (3) compelling employees to accept the employer’s proposals and
(4) prohibiting the peaceful exercise of their right to strike without resorting to
the RLA procedures they were denied in the first place.

It seems Judge Marrero has drawn the "absurd" conclusion above. Of course an ABA conference doesn't enforce the laws of the land, judges do. I'm confident that the AFA will appeal this decision, the books are far from closed on this matter.